Dinos and Zombies and Flares
by GremlinTree
Summary: Lions and tigers and bears? Pssht. After picking up Lion, Dorothy and the gang take a lengthy detour on the way to Emerald City and encounter horrors much worse than mere poppy fields... Characters based on the Toronto cast of A.L.Webber's stage version of "The Wizard of Oz".
1. Scarecrow Is Confused

**Dinos and Zombies and Flares **

_Important things to note, or not: The characters here are based on the Toronto cast's stage performance of "Andrew Lloyd Webber's _The Wizard of Oz_". What this means: Dorothy is older – maybe 17, give or take a year (the actress is older than that but I imagine that was about the age they were going for); Lion is almost certainly a friend of Dorothy, if you know what I mean; Scarecrow is younger, more comical, and considerably dippier. If parts of the plot smack of the original book, that's because, yes, I lifted some ideas from it. And lastly, this is still, like the original story, high fantasy – remember to suspend your disbelief!_

_I've spent hours reading about Baum's version of Oz, as well as Thompson's version of Oz, and of course thinking about the movie, and pondering all of the conflicting information. I've read about the history, the economy, the magic, the creatures, the lands, the natural laws, and the unnatural laws of Oz, et ad nauseum, and I've concluded that I can't write this story in that canon. So not everything will match what Baum or Thompson or the movie dictates! For instance: apparently there's no sickness or true death in Oz, but I am incapable of writing a story that doesn't include sickness or true death, so this story will have sickness or true death. Another example – this totally won't make sense to anybody who tries to follow this journey according to an official map of Oz. If you don't know anything about Oz beyond what happened in the '39 film, then this will all make perfect sense! _

_Rated for accidental vulgar innuendo, mention of adult themes, zombies, some violent/gory scenes, and scattered swearing. Scattered as the swearing is, none of it is really necessary. I know some people get offended by unnecessary swearing. I'll warn you again at the beginning of the chapters. _

_Genre: Fantasy/Adventure/Humor/Horror_

_I disclaim everything._

* * *

**1: Scarecrow Is Confused**

_A/N:_ _Warning_: _Contains accidental vulgar innuendo._

* * *

"Curse this rain," muttered Tin Man.

"But it's good for the crops!" said Scarecrow, trying to force into his voice more cheer than he actually had.

"What crops? What are you talking about?" said Tin Man, a little exasperated.

"I don't know," Scarecrow admitted. "It's just something my farmer would say when it rained." Tin Man didn't respond, instead gazing out into the night-black torrent with his jaw set in a grim line. His jaw was always set in a grim line, of course. Scarecrow supposed that Tin Man couldn't help but have a grimly-set jaw, unless he wanted to hire a tinsmith to set his jaw to be perpetually jovial. There was, for a man made of tin, much to be grim about at the moment. It was raining, and they hadn't been able to find a very dry place to stop for the night. They had come across an overhanging ledge not far from the yellow path. There was space beneath for Dorothy to curl up and sleep, and space for Tin Man and Scarecrow to stand near the edge – but only barely. Tin Man's joints were stiff from the unavoidable drips, yet he hated to move about to oil them for fear of creaking loudly and waking Dorothy.

As for Scarecrow, he was worrying about another phrase he'd heard, this one from out of the mouth of the farmer's wife as she chided the farmer himself. After having cast her divining stones and seeing the Caput Draconis staring back at her, and after having decided that this clearly meant that luck was about to bring them much-needed rain, she'd say, _now don't you forget to bring that scarecrow in before the rains come, husband of mine. It'll rot in a flash and then you'll have to make another one._ Of course, the rain never came; not while Scarecrow had been nailed to the post. Scarecrow wasn't really sure how long 'a flash' was but he wasn't thrilled at the prospect of getting soaked and finding out.

The only ones of their little party that didn't seem to mind the rain were Toto and Lion, who both shook off the water as if it were nothing. Lion had been having more trouble shaking off the fact that it was night, which he found to be inherently terrifying, but not terrifying enough to forget about his hunger, which had become considerable. He'd gone off into the darkness to rustle up some food, and Toto had gone along with him.

"Good thing it's not cold too," said Tin Man softly.

"Yeah, I know," agreed Scarecrow, and then, "Why's that good?"

"Dorothy. There's nothing more miserable for a meat person than being cold and wet. Even if we wanted to start a fire there's nothing dry anywhere that would catch a flame." Dorothy had said she had a flint and steel given to her by the munchkins but so far she hadn't had to use them. Scarecrow, everlastingly fearful of fire, was quite all right with that. Better a slow end by rot than a quick end by flame. Or did he really mean that? Perhaps it would be better to go quickly than to experience every horrifying little detail that would accompany rotting – first his fingers would go, then his nose would rot right off, and then maybe his feet would just –

"Scarecrow?" asked Tin Man in surprise. "Are you all right?"

"What, me? Yeah, of course."

"You looked like you'd seen a ghost."

"Oh. Well I was just wondering whether it would be better to burn quickly or rot slowly."

"For goodness' sake, why would you think about that?"

"Um… I don't really know. I've got to think about _something_, don't I?"

"Why? You haven't got a brain."

"Well that doesn't necessarily mean … It's not … Um…"

"Don't hurt yourself."

"Oh, I don't feel anyth – "

"Nevermind, shhh!" hissed Tin Man, swiveling rapidly – his knees creaked out their protest – to face into the rain again. "Do you hear that?"

Scarecrow listened. At first he heard nothing but the drumming of the rain, but promptly he could make out a familiar, measured clicking sound, and…

"Whistling?" he whispered. The clicking sound – footsteps.

"Someone's coming down the path," said Tin Man. He leaned out to get a better view, oblivious to the thin sheet of rain that proceeded to drench his head. "It's a man," he said. "Why would a man be traveling through the forest at this hour – "

Tin Man's voice cut off suddenly. Scarecrow barely had time to turn his head to see what was going on before Tin Man had slipped on a patch of wet moss and gone down into the bushes in front of them with a rather impressive crash.

"Oh, no, don't go in there!" cried Scarecrow. "Those bushes are all wet, you'll rust!"

"I… know…" groaned Tin Man from within the foliage. There was some weak thrashing but the movement slowed and Scarecrow, knowing that at this point the Tin Man wouldn't be going anywhere without outside assistance, stepped down from the small enclave to help his friend.

"Oi!" said a voice, and though Scarecrow hadn't known Tin Man for more than a handful of days, he thought it curious that Tin Man would say _oi_ of all things, at a time like this. Perhaps it was another word for help. Or perhaps he was just trying to say _oil_ but couldn't quite make the 'L' come out right.

"I say, excuse me, did you hear me there, young man?" said a voice again, and this time it was quite apparent that it wasn't Tin Man that had spoken. Scarecrow looked away from the bushes into which he'd been about to plunge, and up through the sheets of rain, and saw that the man Tin Man had seen had come upon them.

"Oh, _you _said 'oi'? Yes, I heard you, pardon my stuffing. I thought my friend had – "

"Is that a _young lady_?" the man suddenly exclaimed, pointing behind Scarecrow. Scarecrow turned to follow his finger; of course the man was pointing at Dorothy, who was sound asleep to the battery of the rain against the leaves and earth.

"Well yes," said Scarecrow, wondering why the man looked so surprised, though he didn't stay surprised-looking for very long. Presently the man's eyebrows knitted together, and then became downright angry-looking, and then Scarecrow found himself to be holding the considerable weight of the man's stare. "What's the matter? Don't you like young ladies?" Scarecrow asked.

The man looked even more aghast, if possible, and in a flash had drawn something from his belt and Scarecrow was confused to realize that it was a rapier, and now the man was pointing it straight at Scarecrow's face.

"I'm sorry!" Scarecrow said. "I didn't mean to offend – "

"Offend? _Offend?_ You've done a bit more than _offend,_ my lad. I'd been expecting to encounter all sorts of undesirable creatures in this forest, but let me tell you, a womanizing reprobate was _not _one of them."

"What? A womanizing repro_what_? I'm not a womanizing rep-thingy, I don't even know what that is!" Scarecrow thought the man sounded educated, judging from his vocabulary, and Scarecrow could not help but feel even stupider in the presence of one so educated.

"Don't get funny with me," the man responded.

"But I'm not trying to be funny!" Scarecrow cried. He thought he could hear Tin Man trying to shout from in the bushes but his grimly-set jaw must have rusted too tightly, and the rain was too loud to let anything else be heard. Scarecrow badly wished Tin Man were standing here right now able to talk; no doubt he'd have a clue as to what was going on.

"Then tell me quite clearly, cad, what are you doing out here at night, in this weather, with such a disheveled young woman?"

Scarecrow didn't respond right away. He glanced back at Dorothy and, yes, she did look a bit disheveled, as young ladies went, though Scarecrow couldn't be sure because she was really the only young lady he'd ever seen up close. Her hair was in less of an order than when he'd first met her and her dress was rather rumpled and there was definitely a considerable amount of mud present, though the same could be said about all of them.

"Oh for goodness' sake," sighed the man. "Excuse me?" he called to Dorothy. "Are you all right? Are you in need of assistan – "

"Ssshhhhh!" hissed Scarecrow, pushing down on the rapier in front of his face as if the blade were causing the noise. "Don't wake her up! She's – "

The man's blade whipped up and slashed across the palm of Scarecrow's glove, then reaffirmed its position in front of his face. Scarecrow let out an inward groan; now the water would get to his straw more easily. At least glove fabric was easier to stitch than the burlap that covered the rest of him. Scarecrow resolved to clear up the mess he'd obviously gotten himself into, before the man decided to cut him in a more problematic area. Scarecrow also was not fond of the idea of this blade-waving man getting much closer to Dorothy.

"I say," said the man, looking at Scarecrow curiously. "Are you drunk?"

"Drunk? Gosh no. I've never dranken before."

"Then why didn't you feel that?"

"Feel what?" Scarecrow said, doing his best to keep his voice down. He knew he tended to get a bit anxious when things didn't make sense to him. Now was not the time for his nerves to get the better of him. The man sighed and let the rapier fall a few inches.

"You can't fool me, rogue. It is quite clear that you are rather smashed. Let the young lady go and I shan't hurt you any more than I already have."

"But I'm _not _smashed, and I'm not holding the young lady captive."

"Then I shall take her," said the man, and moved as if to pass Scarecrow.

"No!" Scarecrow cried, and placed himself squarely in the man's path. The man glared at him.

"You said," the man growled, "you weren't holding her captive. If you'll excuse me – "

"Just because _I'm _not holding her captive doesn't mean _you _should," Scarecrow protested.

"I say, you are being irritatingly obstinate."

"I am?"

"Rather. I wish to escort the young lady to her home. Tell me where she comes from."

"Kansas."

"… Kansas?"

"Yes, that's right. But don't worry, that's where she's headed right now, sort of. Or… she will be, when she wakes up. From her nap. Just please don't wake her up."

"Aha…" said the man, and took a swift step away before once again raising his rapier. Scarecrow held up his hands. "I understand now. As I'd suspected. You shan't be fooling me with your inane words of placation. Clearly you have been harassing this dame."

"Harass? What do you mean, harass?" cried Scarecrow, who didn't know the meaning of half the words the man had just said.

"What do you mean, what do I mean? I mean what anybody means when they say harass. I mean you've obviously been dogging her – "

"_What_? What does that mean, _dogged?" _said Scarecrow, beside himself and cursing his lack of intelligence.

"Follow! You've followed her! What are you, deaf?"

"Well of course I've followed her, I've been following her for _days _– "

"Ah! I knew it! And here she has collapsed out of fright, no doubt!"

"Oh, I hardly think out of fright. She's rather brave," babbled Scarecrow. "I imagine she's simply rather exhausted, we'd been at it for hours – "

"I _beg _your pardon, you've been at _what?_"

"What?"

"What have you been _at_?" the man asked, waggling his eyebrows in a most severe manner. The Scarecrow thought it a strange request from the man, to go from threatening him with a rapier to asking him to tell their travel story, but Scarecrow rather preferred the latter, so he complied.

"Well, first we had a little frolic in the cornfield – "

"Oh my," said the man, turning away as if appalled. "Nevermind. Please don't go on – "

" – because someone had nailed me up on the pole, and I was a bit stiff. Took her a while to get me down, I was hung rather well."

"I didn't really want to hear – "

"Well you did ask, you know, and besides, it makes a good story, far as I can tell. So anyways, once she got me down, I told her all about my problem, see, how I don't have a… a… a thingamabob. She doesn't seem to mind much. She asked me if I'd like to go off with her – said she wanted to get home."

"I shall be sick."

"So we hit the trail for a while but then _he _comes up," Scarecrow said, pointing to Tin Man, hidden in the bushes, who may have been urgently yelling for Scarecrow to stop talking but couldn't make himself audible. "Well, he didn't 'come up', I guess, we came up on him. We gave him an oiling, he was all stiff too, if you know what I mean. Looks like he could do with a bit of an oil job right now, actually. Hey, are you all right, sir?"

The man had mostly lowered his rapier now, and looked rather limp and ill. Scarecrow, who could see as well at night as during the day, perceived that the man's face had turned a curious shade of red.

"I must apologize," said the man, "for having accused you of being a womanizing reprobate."

"Oh that's okay."

"I see instead I have come across a madman drunkard and his young and willing wench."

"I… Excuse me?" said Scarecrow, whose vocabulary inexplicably contained the word 'wench'. "It… She… _Dorothy_? How dare you!" Scarecrow didn't often feel true anger but now that he had it he wasn't sure what to do with it – he could go off on a tirade, but he knew well enough he'd end up tripping over his own words. He felt that shoving the man over into the mud would probably be justified, if uninspired, but he didn't want to anger the man with the blade, lest he put Dorothy in danger.

A bark erupted from the path behind the man and Scarecrow was relieved to see Toto bounding up to them, yipping and dancing angrily about the feet of the new intruder. If Toto was here, that would mean –

"Oh thank goodness," Scarecrow said, as Lion appeared out of the rain. The cat's figure was shaggy with water, lending him the rather illusory but ultimately convincing appearance of being a thing of the wild, savage and terrifying. Scarecrow hoped that Lion's presence would prevent the man from trying anything violent. The man turned to see who Scarecrow was looking at and his face promptly drained of color. Scarecrow thought the man might flee, so continued quickly. "Lion, you've come right on time. This guy just called Dorothy a – "

"Aaaah!" yelled Lion, as his eyes settled on the man. "Who IS that?"

"I was just saying," pressed Scarecrow, but caught sight of Dorothy – Toto had just woke her with his barking. She had sat up and was now gazing out at them, looking perplexed.

"What's going on? Who is that?" she said.

"He's – " began Scarecrow excitedly, but then realized he hadn't a clue. "Right, _who _are you?" he asked the man.

"Gerty," the man replied, still bewildered.

"I told Gerty what we were doing here, since he asked, and he just – you wouldn't believe what he said, he said – he just – he said – he said you were – "

"My goodness, Scarecrow," said Dorothy, coming to her feet and giving Scarecrow a rather concerned look. "You're so upset you can't even speak. Why don't you sit? Gerty can tell me what happened."

"He called you a wench!" Scarecrow finally managed to blurt out.

Lion gasped, and Dorothy looked as if she'd been struck.

"Excuse me?" she said, and turned to regard Gerty in an entirely new light.

"That's what_ I_ said," said Scarecrow. Dorothy took a step towards Gerty, a stormcloud settling upon her brow. Scarecrow put a hand on her shoulder.

"He's got a blade, Dorothy," he hissed. Dorothy pushed past his hand.

"He may have a blade but he obviously has no sense of courtesy, calling a person he's never even met a wench."

"He called me a madman drunkard," Scarecrow said.

"You beast!" Dorothy cried up at Gerty's face, indignant. Gerty, for his part, looked as if he were ready to either flee or will himself to wake up from an especially nonsensical dream, or perhaps both.

"He said I was a womanizing rep-ro-bate too," Scarecrow added carefully, surprising himself by remembering the word, the meaning of which was still a mystery to him.

"Oh, how dare you!" said Dorothy to Gerty.

"I said that too," said Scarecrow, though at the moment Dorothy seemed more content on haranguing Gerty than listening to Scarecrow.

"Calling a harmless person like him such names, and calling _me _a… a… Wait, you didn't think that _we_… You didn't think _Scarecrow_ and I were…"

"Funny name, that," said Gerty, faintly.

"That's not his _name, _that's what he _is,_" said Dorothy, slowly.

"Ohhhh," Gerty said, his eyebrows inching up his forehead. "A-ha… My sight isn't what it used to be," he said, squinting at Scarecrow. "So you were being… literal… when you said someone had _nailed_," and here Gerty paused to mime the action of someone taking a hammer to a nail, "you up to the pole. And that they had hung you well – _properly_ – so you wouldn't fall off."

Scarecrow, who wasn't sure what else he could have meant when he'd said those things, nodded.

"That explains the frolic in the cornfield," Gerty muttered. "And I suppose when you talked about the Tin Man needing to be oiled – "

"Oh _my_," said Dorothy, slightly flustered and seeming to then understand something that was still eluding Scarecrow. "Yes, mister Gerty, I think I can imagine the conversation you two had… Please take everything he said quite literally, and… Oh, but where _is _Tin Man?"

"He fell in the bushes," Scarecrow said, and Dorothy immediately plunged through the leaves and twigs. Scarecrow followed. There was Tin Man, frozen in a half-crouched position. He was making strange rhythmic noises, and at first Scarecrow feared he might be crying, but Dorothy, who had the oil can, first loosened the hinges of his jaw, and it became obvious that Tin Man was laughing, and rather heartily.

"Oh, it's no use," Dorothy worried, despite Tin Man's mirth. "It's still raining, let's get you back where it's dry before we loosen you up."

When they emerged from the bushes with the chuckling, statue-stiff Tin Man between them, Gerty looked curiously relieved. He even came forward to help them haul Tin Man to the area under the overhang.

"My apologies," he said, "to you, miss Dorothy, I quite misunderstood the situation. And my apologies to you, Scarecrow, I'm afraid you had me rather baffled."

"It's alright," Scarecrow said. "I know how you feel. I'm usually baffled myself. I haven't got a… a…"

"A brain," finished Dorothy for him.

"Right, that," Scarecrow said. "That's why we're going to Emerald City. He's going to help Dorothy find Kansas, and he's going to give me a… a brain – "

" – and me a heart," said Tin Man, who had finally managed to stifle his laughs.

"And me some nerves," scowled Lion, obviously unhappy about how he'd handled himself, as usual.

"_He_?" said Gerty. "He _who_?"

"Oh, the wizard, of course! I've heard all about how wonderful he is!" said Dorothy.

"Ah, the Wizard of Oz," said Gerty, thoughtfully.

"Do you know him?" asked Dorothy.

"Not _personally, _no, but I have spent my almost-sixty years of life in Emerald City."

"You _have?_" gasped Dorothy. "Oh, do tell us about it! Is the wizard as wonderful as they claim?"

"I couldn't say, young miss, couldn't say. I've never seen him. I know he's the one who's behind all the emerald splendor, and that, at least, is indisputable. The city is a wonder in itself."

"Are you headed there?" asked Dorothy.

"No, I'm headed away."

"Away?" said Lion. "Why would you _leave _Emerald City?"

"Oh," sighed Gerty. "Just a fancy of mine. I have long dreamed of seeing what else the world has to offer, finding what else is worth seeing besides emerald, emerald, emerald all the time. I only regret that I hadn't made the choice to travel sooner."

"That sounds familiar," said Dorothy, to herself. "Well, there isn't much room here beneath this overhang but you're welcome to stay here until the sun rises… if it ever does."

"It always does, miss Dorothy. I thank you for your kind offer to one who has been none too kind to you, but I should like to get going straight away. I've already been soaked, I don't need to stay dry. It is not as early as you might think – six in the morning, I'd wager. The sun will be up quite soon, which you will see when these clouds lift."

"Rather an astute temporal observation," commented Tin Man.

"Yes, well, I had been the official timekeeper of Emerald City before my recent retirement. I have never been late for anything in my life, and I daresay I'm almost too late to see the sights I wish to see before I die, which is why I'm in rather a hurry to get along now, for I suspect there is much to see."

"I should hope so," said Dorothy. "Well goodbye, then. Thank you for helping to move Tin Man."

"Yes, thank you," said Tin Man.

"Good luck with that brain, Scarecrow," said Gerty. "And good luck finding Kansas, miss Dorothy."

He waved to them, and very quickly he'd taken to the yellow path and had been removed from their sight by the sheets of rain. The rain, Scarecrow noticed, seemed to be thinking about letting up, which was great news – not only could Tin Man have a chance at drying out, but he himself could as well. He'd gotten positively soaked during his time standing out and talking with Gerty.

True to Scarecrow's suspicion, the rain fell back to a mere drizzle in a matter of minutes, and continued to dwindle. And true to Gerty's word, now that the clouds were thinning, the company could make out a glow coming through in the east. Presently a crack in the clouds opened and welcome morning sun came streaming through the forest at them, and a warm breeze rounded out the morning's promise of being a good one. Though Dorothy hadn't slept very well, and though she was still disheveled and muddy, she very happily went about oiling Tin Man's joints until he moved as well as he had a day before.

Lion, for his part, seemed much more content, now that the rain and the night was over, as was his hunger. Nobody asked him what he'd done about the latter problem; presumably only Toto knew, and Toto was not one to go on about such things, unless squirrels were involved, and Dorothy hadn't seen any squirrels in Oz yet.

"Lion," she said, "how much further until the edge of the forest?"

"Not too long," he said. "From here, it usually takes me a day, maybe a day and a half to get to the forest's edge. But then again I'm usually zig-zagging from tree to tree and hiding behind things for stretches of time and creeping about on my belly. We'll get there sooner at the rate we're going, as long as we don't encounter – "

Something was crashing through the brush towards them.

"Aaaah!" Lion shrieked, and placed Tin Man squarely between himself and the oncoming noise.

"What is it, Lion?" Dorothy asked, clutching at Tin Man's arm, which now held his axe aloft. Scarecrow jumped into the air to hear such a ruckus coming their way, and, after taking a moment to find his feet, joined the group.

"It could only be one thing," Lion whimpered. "There's only one thing with enough guts to go rampaging through the forest like that!"

"What? What is it?" asked Scarecrow, his voice pitched several tones higher than Lion's.

"Oh gods, it's the king of the forest! We're dead, we're dead!"

"Lion, what _is _it? What's coming?" Dorothy demanded. Toto stood bravely at Tin Man's feet, growling at the oncoming beast, but Dorothy was afraid that this beast could more than outmatch them all in the inevitable fight.

"The most f-f-formidable, t-t-terrifying being in all of Oz! Oh, kill me now, Tin Man! While you still have the arms to swing an axe!"

"What an awful thing to say," said Scarecrow, but though he didn't have the same fears as one made of flesh and bone, his trepidation was mounting with every passing second, until the crashing grew so great that the ground seemed to tremble beneath their feet and the very air seemed to flee away from the forest beast.

Gerty erupted from the bushes ahead of them.

"_Gerty?_" Tin Man cried. "Why, it's only you! We thought some monster was coming! You sure make a heck of a lot of noise when you… when you…"

Gerty didn't stop. He plunged straight past them, shouting as he went:

"_Run! It's coming!_"

The great crashing hadn't stopped with Gerty's arrival. The pebbles upon the path leapt up around their feet. As a unit, the group turned and followed Gerty off the path and into the forest in frantic retreat from the unnamed, the wild, the incontestably savage.

Scarecrow tripped.


	2. The Dinosaurus

**2: The Dinosaurus **

_A/N:_ _This is where I recommend that you temporarily forget everything you happen to know about the layout of the land of Oz. _

_This is where I also have to rant. This has nothing to do with this story, so skip down if you want, but I've been reading critics' reviews of this performance as it travels around the USA and I'm angry. Everyone's entitled to their opinion but everyone is also entitled to bitch about other people's opinions, and in my opinion, the opinions of these critics smell like they were shipped straight out of Nastyland. Some people think the show is just pure fun, which it is. Most reviews seem to agree about a few things, among them that Scarecrow is adorable and hilarious, which he is. A few people comment that the portrayal of Tin Man is lackluster, which irks me enough as it is, but even more people say that the portrayal of Lion is downright yawn-worthy and that the actor contributes nothing. That's a load of crap. Every one of Dorothy's three Ozite companions are portrayed so wonderfully that their performances totally arrested my imagination and still haven't let it go and I'm totally cool with that. In my honest-to-Oz opinion, these three actors (and Andrew L. Webber) put more personality into their roles than did the original '39 cast, who I ALSO LOVE but not enough for me to have felt inspired into writing about them. The actors who play Tin Man and Lion in this stage adaptation are totally the bee's knees and if I had the moneybags I'd watch them perform every Sunday for the rest of the year and beyond and still enjoy the hell out of it. Maybe they'll release a DVD of the performance after it's done touring but probably not because reality can only be so excellent before no more excellence will fit. But if they did, I'd be all over it. End rant. _

* * *

"Come on, come on!" Dorothy yelped, hauling Scarecrow up by the arm and dragging him into a run. "It's the dinosaurus, isn't it?" she called out to Lion.

"Yes! Run!" was Lion's reply, from out ahead of them by several leaps.

"I thought your lines about the dinosaurus were hyperbole!" Dorothy shouted to Lion through her gasps. The footsteps of the monster behind them were getting louder – the company ran harder, if possible.

"I thought you just needed something to rhyme with 'forest'!" Tin Man wheezed, a few steps to the right of Dorothy. Thankfully his joints were still working well.

"I thought you were making words up!" Scarecrow cried. Dorothy kept a hand latched securely around his wrist lest he fall again, for which he was very grateful, because his normally shaky sense of balance was being compromised by a terrible case of the willies as well as the quaking ground. He had half a mind to simply play dead – surely the dinosaurus wouldn't be interested in straw – but he'd be smashed to bits under the monster's claws or paws or flippers or whatever it had, and then it would eat Dorothy and the others, and then who would put Scarecrow back together?

It dawned distressingly upon Scarecrow that if Dorothy were to be eaten by the dinosaurus, Scarecrow would have rather more to be upset about than his own predicament. Dorothy stumbled and lost her grip on Scarecrow's wrist; Scarecrow reached out to catch her hand and pull her up, and they continued together, Toto dashing just a step ahead of them.

"Drat these shoes," Dorothy huffed, and Scarecrow would have nodded in sympathy if he hadn't been concentrating on keeping his feet under control. "Oh, what are we to do?" she gasped, breathless. "We can't keep running like this! Lion, you've… you've lived in this forest all your life! How have you… How have you escaped from the dinosaurus in the past?"

"I'll tell you all about the natural history of the dinosaurus if we live through this!" shouted Lion. "For now, run faster!"

"But where are we running?" Dorothy cried.

"I don't know! I'm following Gerty! He seems smart!"

"Well ask him –"

"Dorothy, look out!" Scarecrow shouted, for the earth-shaking steps had gotten much, much closer, and quite suddenly a foot slammed into the ground not two short strides behind them. Scarecrow despaired to notice that its claws were about the length of his own arm. Something massive blocked out the light above them, and the trees to their immediate left and right splintered. Scarecrow stopped and fell to his knees, pulling Dorothy down with him and doing his best to squeeze them both into the smallest shape possible in order to lessen their chances of getting squashed, and swiftly the thunderous thing had passed above them.

"_Get down!"_ Dorothy screamed to her friends ahead of them, and despite the incredible rumpus that the forest king was making, Scarecrow was sure Tin Man and Lion and Gerty had heard her, and he was also sure that if he'd had ear drums, they would have ruptured; Dorothy could _scream._

Clinging to each other, Dorothy and Scarecrow got to their feet and hastened forward cautiously, listening to the dinosaurus's footsteps going farther and farther. They nearly collided with Tin Man and Lion and Gerty and Toto, who had all come rushing back towards Scarecrow and Dorothy. For a moment there was a confusion of breathless gasping and wild disbelief that the dinosaurus had passed over them without having even seen them, but then a roar shook the morning dew off of the canopy above them. Dorothy frantically wiped away at the drops that landed on Tin Man.

"Damnation, now he's _really_ angry," puffed Gerty. "Lion, I know there's a big canyon around here somewhere, where is it? I'm all turned around."

"That way," said Lion, pointing north with a shaking paw, "but it's not a _canyon_, it's a crevasse of despair."

"Surely it's not – "

"Seriously. It's called The Crevasse of Despair. Believe it or not, I've never gone to see it."

"Go," said Gerty, urging them all in a northerly direction. "Go, go, everybody run! The thing will find us! There's a chance we can trick it and it'll fall into the crevasse!"

"What? What kind of brainless plan is _that_?" puffed Tin Man.

"It's a plan! What else do you want? _Run_!"

Scarecrow wasn't sure how he felt about trapping himself between The Crevasse of Despair and a rampaging dinosaurus but there was something inexplicably alluring about running towards a plan, however brainless it was. For long minutes they ran, and Dorothy's breath became ragged and Toto was wheezing and it almost seemed as if they could slow down, because the sound of a pursuing dinosaurus was not following them, but Gerty wouldn't let them slow.

The forest did not do them a favor when it came to showing them the crevasse; at first they could see nothing suggesting a crevasse, and then they were upon it so suddenly that it was almost too much to ask of them to stop in their tracks before careening over the edge.

Lion stood near the rim for a moment before turning around and calmly making his way back towards the forest.

"Woa, where are you going? Dinosaurus, remember?" said Tin Man.

"I'd rather take my chances with the dinosaurus," Lion whimpered. "I just learned that I'm terrified of heights." Dorothy and Scarecrow reached out to grab Lion's shoulders.

"Are you surprised?" asked Tin Man, who was carefully peering over the edge of the crevasse. Dorothy didn't seem to want to get any closer to the edge, and Scarecrow felt no need whatsoever to be judging the distance to the bottom, so stayed next to Dorothy at the edge of the wood.

"So what's the plan, Gerty?" Scarecrow asked hopefully. "How are we going to trick it into falling?"

"I haven't… haven't quite gotten that far yet," the man said, catching his breath and resting his hands on his knees.

"Oh, I know, I know!" exclaimed Scarecrow. "Lion, you could jump and carry us across one by one on your back! I'll go first because we don't know if you can jump that far and if we fall at least I won't die or get super dented."

"Ha," said Lion, weakly. "Ha ha."

"How brave of you to offer, Scarecrow. That's a fair idea and it may have worked," said Dorothy gently, "if the crevasse was, you know, not so wide… maybe a quarter or a fifth as wide as it is."

"Not even the _dinosaurus_ could jump the crevasse," said Tin Man, shaking his head. "Not even a mega-colossal-behemoth dinosaurus could jump that."

"That doesn't exist, does it?" squeaked Lion.

"Of course not," said Tin Man.

"Oh good. I was going to have a heart attack."

"Well let's build a bridge!" said Scarecrow. "You have an axe, Tin Man, you can cut the trees down and we can nail them together!"

"We don't have any nails," said Tin Man.

"We haven't the time either," said Gerty, and pointed at the woods. They held their breath and felt, rather than heard, another furious roar shaking the air and earth. A _boom boom boom _shook the ground, far away now but after a few seconds of listening it became obvious that they were footsteps, and they were coming closer.

"Oh, _now _what?" cried Dorothy, scooping Toto up into her arms and holding him close. Gerty leaned carefully over the crevasse and peered down, coloring slightly green.

"I'd been hoping we could wait till the beast came upon us and then hang ourselves over the edge by a stray root or something – perhaps the beast would go over too, thinking to chase us. Its brain is quite small."

"I don't even _have _a brain and I wouldn't be stupid enough to fall for that one," said Scarecrow.

"Just as well," lamented Gerty. "There's not much to grab onto to keep from falling to our deaths."

With that statement, Lion let out a despairing wail, took a tight hold of his tail, and began to wring it.

"Oh, oh, oh! Plan!" shouted Scarecrow, and everybody turned to him, though not with much expectation. "This one will work! This one will work!"

"_What_ already?" said Tin Man.

"Axe! Tree! You could axe and the tree and then over," Scarecrow babbled, a bit too anxious to form a proper sentence, but thankfully the others seemed to get it. Tin Man cast his gaze about for the tallest tree around, but Gerty looked concerned.

"Well… I've heard it said that the tallest trees in Oz are to be found growing only along the rim of the great crevasse… But a tree tall enough to reach across will take time to chop down – time we don't have!" The group listened for another moment; indeed, the beast seemed to be making a neat beeline for them. How many minutes did they have? Five? Two? Mere seconds?

"Chop," said Lion in an unfamiliar, dazed voice. "You with your axe," he said, pointing to Tin Man, "and you with your rapier," he said to Gerty.

"What are _you _doing?" asked Dorothy.

"I'm the fastest runner among us, I'm going to go distract the d-d-d-d-dinosaurus."

Scarecrow did a double-take to make sure that this lion was the same lion they'd been spending time with, though the stutter should have assured him that it was indeed their lion.

"You've found your courage!" cried Dorothy, with a smile.

"No I haven't," said Lion as he bounded into the forest. "This is just creative stupidity! I'm sure I'll regret this! I already do regret this!"

After he'd left, Tin Man and Gerty immediately got to work arguing over which tree was the tallest and most likely to reach across The Crevasse of Despair. They settled on one quickly, though not as quickly as the party would have liked. Gerty had been told the truth – there were several breathtakingly tall trees in the vicinity, the likes of which Scarecrow had never seen before. Scarecrow and Dorothy watched anxiously as the two people set to chopping, each on opposite sides of the trunk.

"How do you know the tree won't fall into the forest instead of over the crevasse?" asked Scarecrow.

"Trust me, I'm a woodsman," said Tin Man. "Professional tree-chopper. If Gerty makes a notch below and on the opposite side as my notch, we'll control which way it falls."

Chips flew as Tin Man hacked away at the giant tree and Gerty did his best to hew away on his side (the more precarious side, as it was alarmingly near the edge of the crevasse). Scarecrow had been listening anxiously to the terrifying noises of an approaching dinosaurus, and now, quite suddenly, they seemed to have stopped getting any closer. It was as if the dinosaurus was now traveling parallel to the crevasse. Or even _away _from them.

"Lion," Dorothy gasped, and latched onto Scarecrow's arm. "Oh, I hope he's being careful."

"Oh, probably not," replied Scarecrow, trying to smile. "I mean he's distracting a dinosaurus."

"What will we do when the tree falls and we cross over?" asked Dorothy. "What will keep the dinosaurus from following us?"

"Did you see the size of that beast's feet?" asked Gerty.

"Yes, quite clearly," said Dorothy.

"It'd break this tree if it tried to cross."

"Eh…" said Tin Man, standing back to consider the girth of the tree's trunk. "I don't know, this trunk is _fat_."

"_Keep chopping!" _ hissed Scarecrow. Tin Man complied, but now that Dorothy had brought up the point, and that Tin Man had brought up the possibility that perhaps the monster could follow them over, a new shine of terror was layered upon the situation. Gerty was huffing mightily, putting a considerable dent into the tree. Tin Man had hacked through nearly half of the tree by the time Scarecrow realized with a peculiar sinking sensation that the ruckus of the dinosaurus was once again approaching.

"Guys," he said uneasily, "I think I'm getting that despair they were talking about when they named this place The Crevasse of Despair."

"The dinosaurus!" Dorothy gasped. "It's coming closer again! Oh no, what's happened to Lion? Chop! Come on, come on, you can do it!" Tin Man hadn't needed to be told, and chopped with a fervor that Scarecrow found to be quite frightening, though not as frightening as the oncoming disaster. Scarecrow couldn't bear to simply stand around, and knew that if he didn't do something with himself he'd end up hopping about in his hysteria, which would, with his luck, send him over the cliff; instead he sat down, forgetting to let go of Dorothy's hand, which brought her to a sit as well.

"_How can you sit at a time like this?_" hissed Gerty.

"Trust me, it's for the better," Scarecrow replied, his voice week. "I wish I could help you! It's just I'm not very strong and I haven't got a blade and anyways I'd probably cut my own leg off, not that it matters since it's just going to get ripped off by a dinosaurus anyways – "

"Don't say that!" said Dorothy, and bravely squeezed his gloved hand. Scarecrow looked at Dorothy and listened to the approach of the dinosaurus – surely now mere seconds away – and time seemed to slow and he felt a wave of what must have been awe. Here was a mere human girl, future lunchmeat for a dinosaurus, _smiling _at him and not minding a bit that the beast was about to spring out of the woods and end everything.

Well, she must have minded somewhat, at least, for her hands were shaking terribly.

"You have," Scarecrow said to her, "courage enough for all eight of us."

"There's five of us. Six plus Toto," she said, and sniffed, glancing down at the dog in her lap.

"If there _were _eight of us, you'd have courage enough for all eight of us."

"That's very sweet of you to say that," Dorothy said, but lowered her head. Scarecrow may not have had much of an intelligence quotient but he could tell as well as the next person when somebody was trying not to cry. The crashing in the woods finally overpowered the _thud, thud, thud _of Tin Man's axe upon the tree. Scarecrow put both arms about Dorothy's shoulders and watched the forest, wondering whether it would be better to spring up and face the beast when it emerged, or if he should stay here, wrapped around Dorothy, and get eaten along with her. It wouldn't matter much, in the end.

"_TIMBER!" _yelled Tin Man, and Scarecrow jumped a bit.

"_What?_" He had to shout to be heard above the roaring and stomping.

"The tree!"

Scarecrow looked up and couldn't believe what he was seeing – the tree appeared to be falling. Towards the crevasse. In a timely fashion.

Dorothy and Gerty pulled him to his feet and, after several attempts, he was standing without their help. He'd been doubting they'd get this far, but in his imagination, they would have watched as the tree fell in slow-motion towards the other side, watched as it just barely reached its top neatly across the far rim, and then cheered because the plan had worked. In reality, they couldn't hear the crash of foliage and branches as the top hit the other side, nor did anybody have the wits to notice when the top hit the other side. Almost before the trunk had stopped moving, Tin Man had hefted Dorothy up onto the trunk, pushed Scarecrow after her, and shouted for them to go. They could no longer make out what he was saying, so loud was the crashing from the forest, but it was easy enough to assume.

Scarecrow took one step out onto the trunk and blanched. Below the trunk lay complete and utter oblivion. Was that a ribbon of mist down there or was that just what infinite space looked like? How many hours would it take to fall that far? How many birds would pick him apart for their nests before he even reached the bottom? He was still damp from the night's rain; perhaps he'd rot away completely before he ever hit bottom –

"_Come on!" _shrilled Dorothy from one step in front of him. "Don't look down!"

"Way too late," wailed Scarecrow, but Dorothy pointed across his chest, back towards Tin Man and Gerty, and Scarecrow saw that the beast had emerged from the forest, affording them all the first good look at it they'd been able to catch, and Scarecrow was suddenly much more inclined to take his chances with The Crevasse of Despair. He immediately set to work forgetting what he'd just seen behind him – the green bristled scales and the arms that reached forth like great fire pokers and the house-sized teeth that glistened sourly in the brilliance of the sun.

"Wait, was that _Lion?"_ he cried, and whirled around again. Sure enough, there Lion was, bounding rapidly towards the tree, a look of sheer terror plastered across his face. Surely he would bowl them over if they stood in his way, so Scarecrow, purely out of necessity, decided that making this crossing was entirely possible, and maybe even highly probable. He took Dorothy's proffered hand, gripped it as tight as he possibly could, and followed her lead across the trunk. It had looked like the longest walk he would ever take but he kept his eyes fastened onto Dorothy's ruby slippers and approximately one blink later he was stepping onto blessed solid ground from amongst the tangle of the canopy branches.

"Oh, Lion! Come on, you can do it!" shouted Dorothy, clinging fiercely to Toto. Scarecrow turned to see that Lion had indeed bounded out onto the trunk, but then seemed to have realized what he'd done, and was now frozen, his attention completely arrested by the immense crevasse. Gerty walked into him from behind, and Tin Man was last in line, looking curiously at peace walking out over The Crevasse of Despair but definitely preoccupied with the dinosaurus. The beast couldn't quite reach Tin Man with its claws but it looked as if it was working on an idea.

"I'm going to go help him," said Dorothy, and took a step back onto the tree.

"No! No no, you stay here, you'll die if you fall," Scarecrow said, and before he knew what he was doing he was back on the tree. _As if you'd fare much better if you fell_, he told himself, but he dragged his gaze up from the trunk to concentrate on his destination, which was Lion, who still hadn't moved.

"Move, Lion! You have to _move_," Gerty was shouting. "You've got the best balance of any of us! You'll be fine, just _move!"_

Lion only quivered. Behind the Tin Man, the dinosaurus had decided that whipping its long tail towards them was the best route. Scarecrow thought this to be a bit silly, if its end goal was to eat them. If its end goal was to have them all fall into the crevasse, then it had a pretty good thing going. Tin Man ducked and narrowly missed being creamed by the tip of the tail as it whizzed above him. The dinosaurus repositioned for another try. Scarecrow, to keep himself from looking down as he made his way towards Lion, watched the trajectory of the beast's tail; it was much lower. It would sweep Tin Man off the trunk and into the depths. He grit his teeth as the tail swung around, but Tin Man leapt into the air just as the tail whizzed beneath him, and he landed safely back onto the trunk. The trunk wobbled with the impact just as Scarecrow reached Lion.

"You've got to move!" Scarecrow shouted, taking hold of Lion's shoulder. Lion didn't look up from his crevasse-ward gaze. Scarecrow crouched low and peered up into the Lion's face.

"You're holding everyone up!" he tried, as loudly as he could to be heard over the unending bellow of the beast. "Tin Man's about to get nailed by the dinosaurus's tail!"

This caused Lion's face to crease itself into an even more extreme image of panic. Scarecrow winced and decided to change tactic.

"It was very brave, what you did," he yelled, "distracting the dinosaurus! You gave us the time we needed! Now keep being brave and come this way!"

Lion finally shouted something in return, but the beast's roaring drowned him out.

"What?" asked Scarecrow.

"The trunk gets _skinnier!"_ Lion cried again, pointing.

"Yes, that's because we're nearing the top of the tree, which means we're almost over to the other side!" This was, of course a lie; they were still only halfway.

"Oh woe!" whimpered Lion. "I can't move, I just _can't_! The others can climb over me!"

"No! Come _on_," urged Scarecrow, yanking at Lion's arm. Unfortunately he was much too heavy and much too stubborn for Scarecrow to budge. "You can't be king of the jungle if you don't _move!" _he said, trying once again to budge Lion, but to no avail. Gerty had now given up trying to urge the lion forward, and instead faced back with his rapier drawn – for what reason Scarecrow couldn't say. Perhaps it was better to meet one's death with a blade drawn, useless as it would be. Dorothy, standing alone, shouted at them from the northern side but Scarecrow couldn't make out what she was saying – his ears were stuffed with panic and a certain degree of frustration.

"If you don't _move_," he tried, "the dinosaurus is either going to come across this trunk, smash Tin Man, eat Gerty, and then floss its teeth with your mane, or it's going to knock the trunk off the edge and you'll go falling all the way down – " Here the beast gave out a bellow that positively shook the trunk under their feet, and Scarecrow paused to let it finish before he continued: " – you'll fall all the way down there and if you don't die of terror by the time you hit the bottom you'll probably shatter every bone in your body, plus some more, into dust and make a big lion-pancake-shaped dent in the rocks below and – " Scarecrow kept talking and tugging on the resolutely immobile Lion's arm, not quite knowing or remembering what he was saying, but he had the inane hope that if he couldn't give Lion the courage to go on, perhaps he could terrify him into something more pliable. Just as Scarecrow started babbling something nonsensical about how it would take the coroners sixteen years to climb down into the crevasse to fetch the bits of lion carcass left over, because that's how deep the crevasse was, Lion seemed to give up. His tail drooped and his eyes sort of crossed and his limbs became more fluid. Scarecrow gave a mighty tug; Lion followed.

In this way, Scarecrow was able to drag Lion nearly to the northern end of the trunk, though Lion didn't seem to be paying much attention to where he was putting his paws, thus making the journey all the more sickeningly exciting. Scarecrow was just starting to pull Lion through the jungle gym of branches when the whole tree shuddered as if struck; Scarecrow looked past Lion and saw, to his utter horror, that the beast had decided to follow them. Scarecrow had been happy when the dinosaurus's tail-waving plot had failed but he wasn't sure how this new plan could possibly _not _end with everybody involved meeting a very bitter and very flat end.

The beast didn't seem to mind that it was balancing on a comparatively thin trunk over an impossibly deep crevasse. In fact it seemed to be smiling now, as it closed the gap between itself and Tin Man. Scarecrow abandoned his fright and nearly all of his caution and set to forcibly manhandling the bulk of a lion through the branches and towards Dorothy, though he was, admittedly, a very bad manhandler. He saw the dinosaurus close, so close now, reaching down with open jaws, reaching as if to pick up the Tin Man, and then something flashed through the air and into the thing's open mouth and the dinosaurus jerked back. The trunk wobbled; Gerty fell to his knees, clinging. The beast let out a strangled roar, swiping at its mouth with its claws. Its teeth were stained crimson. Scarecrow chanced a look at Tin Man. He was still standing, though he no longer had his axe. He'd thrown it into the mouth of the dinosaurus, but he was now effectively helpless.

"Come on, come on, come on," chanted Scarecrow, mostly to himself, and didn't even protest when Dorothy came out into the branches to help him. The trunk shook again and let out a nerve-splitting _crack_ and Scarecrow nearly fell, but his sleeve caught on a branch and he was able to haul himself back up, though he ripped a sizeable hole in the burlap behind his shoulder. Straw flew, caught by an updraft, and Scarecrow felt queasy.

They were three steps away, two, from solid ground. Dorothy leapt down from the tree first, one hand buried in Lion's mane to drag him along. Scarecrow was now behind Lion, and Gerty was bumping into Scarecrow, and Tin Man was pressed against Gerty, who seemed to be snagged on a branch, and the beast was fighting to get its jaws around the tree's arms; branches snapped and flew through the air, mingling with straw and shrieks and the bellow of the beast. Scarecrow felt the Lion stumble out onto solid ground, and Scarecrow followed closely, completely giving up on the idea of a graceful landing, trying to pull Gerty along with him but Gerty was stuck fast.

The beast cleared the branches and was reaching again, and Tin Man had nowhere to go because Gerty couldn't move. Scarecrow wondered why in the world the beast would be so intent upon eating a man made out of tin, but it didn't seem to matter much _why_, because either way it was about to happen –

Gerty took hold of Tin Man's tin collar and lifted him neatly up above his head before tossing him out onto solid ground, or rather onto soft ground, for Tin Man landed squarely upon Scarecrow. Briefly, Scarecrow wondered if Gerty had been holding out on them and was actually a super-strength hero, for having lifted Tin Man like he had, but as Tin Man struggled to his feet, Scarecrow remembered that tin was actually rather light and any relatively fit man would have been able to do that and that Gerty was not, in fact, endowed with super-strength, which really was too bad, because if he had been he could have just socked the dinosaurus in the nose and sent it flying, but instead the dinosaurus's jaws darted neatly down and closed over Gerty's head and one entire arm.

Dorothy screamed and Tin Man yelled and Scarecrow made a rather embarrassing high-pitched noise. Lion simply fainted. Though they all (except Lion) started forward, there was simply nothing any of them could do, though Scarecrow would not have realized it if there had been. He was too terrified to even lament the fact that he was awful at thinking up ways to save people whose heads were trapped in the maw of a monster. If the dinosaurus had chosen to stand there for a week, waving Gerty's body back and forth like it was some sort of flag, Scarecrow probably would have stood there for a week making the same embarrassing, high-pitched noise.

It came as a great surprise when Gerty's free arm swung up in a big, flashing arc, burying his rapier to the hilt, at an angle just below the beast's right eyeball.

The dinosaurus forgot that it had been chewing on someone. It forgot that it was balancing precariously on a trunk, if it had ever known as much in the first place. It forgot about its inexplicable desire to consume a man made out of tin. It let out another strangled bellow and shook its head furiously from side to side, and from its mouth flew Tin Man's axe, which hurtled down into the crevasse; a spray of bright blood, which spangled the air in every direction; and Gerty's body, which thumped onto the ground at Dorothy's feet, rolled once, and lay still.

When the company looked up from where the man had landed, they saw the dinosaurus finally tip, overbalance, and disappear beneath the lip of the crevasse in a cloud of shrieks and bellows. As if to get in a last desperate jab, one of its great hind claws latched around the trunk of the tree and took their makeshift bridge down into the abyss with it.

Nobody watched the dinosaurus go, and nobody wanted to hear the impact, but the persistent, agonized roars were suddenly and noticeably silenced several long moments after the beast had fallen.


	3. What Gerty Said

**3: What Gerty Said**

* * *

_A/N:__Warning: Some gristly bits and disproportionate amounts of blubbering. _

* * *

If Gerty hadn't groaned then, there was no telling how long their little party would have stood huddled together, staring at the spot the dinosaurus had just vacated. Dorothy acted first, uttering something unintelligible and hurrying over to where Gerty lay. Tin Man and Toto followed on her heels, and Scarecrow after that. If Lion had been conscious no doubt he would have kept out of the way, but as it was he was still passed out and showing no signs of coming to.

"Oh," mumbled Scarecrow as he knelt by Dorothy and caught sight of Gerty's condition. Dorothy's hands flew to her mouth to hide a gasp, and the grim set of Tin Man's jaw seemed especially appropriate.

"It… it… it… fell?" wheezed Gerty, looking up at them each in turn.

"… What?" asked Scarecrow, and sadly, he was the only one out of the three onlookers who was able to say anything at all. Scarecrow knew very well that Gerty was asking about the fate of the dinosaurus, but Scarecrow's current rattled state was such that the only response he could force from his mouth was his go-to fail-safe, which Gerty apparently found to be humorous, because the man then tried to laugh.

"Ha… ha… ha ha…" His weak laughter dissolved into a few pathetic, gurgling coughs. "That's right… you haven't a brain, you brainless… You brainless…"

"Womanizing reprobate?" Scarecrow finished for him, softly, in a completely futile attempt to lighten the mood. A small part of him was upset to see a full-grown man with a full-grown brain struggling with words in a manner Scarecrow was all too familiar with. The larger part of him was in shock, for though he'd known that meat people were made of meat, he'd never seen the actual evidence until now. He was quite surprised to learn that the inner parts of such a person smelled fresh and remarkably pleasant, like alfalfa and sweet pea blossoms.

"No," Gerty said with a smile. "Forget that, forget what I called you before. You're… you're a Samaritan scarecrow, is what you are…"

Scarecrow did not, of course, know what a Samaritan was. He nodded anyways.

"Oh, mister Gerty," Dorothy said, having finally found her voice behind her alarm. "I-I'm afraid I don't know much about first aid, I sure wish I did." Her hands fluttered helplessly across Gerty's front, tracing a trembling line above the disheveled mash-up of torn clothing and bloody things. "Tin Man, you wouldn't happen to know anything about first aid?"

"I'm afraid not," said Tin Man.

"Well… Well _surely _we can do _something,_" said Dorothy. She got up to fetch her basket and took a moment to rummage through it, looking for something useful. While she was away, Gerty reached up a shaking hand and snatched at Tin Man's arm.

"How does it look?" he whispered to Tin Man.

"Gerty, it… It doesn't look very good," Tin Man responded, sweeping his eyes across Gerty's front. "I wouldn't know, of course…"

"Bah," said Gerty, waving one hand dismissively. The sweet-scented air wafted across Scarecrow's face and he couldn't tell how many fingers the hand still had, but there had been some anatomical displacements so Scarecrow looked away. Dorothy came back to them, clutching a beautiful white handkerchief that looked as if it belonged in the hands of a queen.

"I don't know if this will help," she said desperately, "but maybe if we just…" She reached out to dab at the wound. Gerty tried to wave her away.

"Not… not with that lovely thing, you'll comple…. completely soil it…" But it was too late; Dorothy had stubbornly soiled it anyways. In a moment it was crimson and the wound looked no better.

"Oh, do we have any water?" Dorothy asked. "Water helps nearly everything."

"Unless you're made of Tin…" Gerty grunted.

"I don't think we have any water," said Scarecrow.

"I'm fine… really," said Gerty. "I imagine I've just… winded myself. Give me a few momen… moments."

"Are you sure?" asked Dorothy. "Pardon, but you do look rather awful."

"At least I'm not bored," Gerty said.

"Does it hurt much?" Dorothy persisted.

"Smarts a bit…

"Oh rats… Well the only thing to do is call for help. There has to be _somebody_ around here, on this side of the crevasse – " Dorothy sprung to her feet with admirable determination, but was halted in her tracks by Gerty.

"_No_!" he fairly shouted. "No, you mustn't go traipsing off… alone… Come here, let me tell you all…"

Dorothy came back down to her knees and Scarecrow watched as she took Gerty's undamaged hand in her own, holding tight as if she thought he was about to run away.

"I studied cartography," Gerty began, and added, "that's map-making, Scarecrow."

"Oh."

"I have… a decent sense of the layout of Oz…" Gerty spoke only a few words each breath, and it was painful to listen to him. "You head to Emerald City, but… you now have no axe with which to fell a tree… even if there were tall trees on this side, and… you cannot cross over again, not… not here. You can no longer follow the yellow bricks…"

The three listeners gave a collective gasp, for the reality of their own situation hadn't yet dawned upon them. Gerty was right, of course. There was no foreseeable way back to the other side.

"There are two bridges that cross the crevasse… One west quite a ways, and one east. East is towards Emerald City. That… is the way you must go. Follow the crevasse… There is a forest, a deep forest, to our east. You will… reach the bridge once you've passed the forest."

Gerty paused to breathe, and with each exhalation the air became lovelier to smell, which only served to confuse Scarecrow's senses. He'd have expected a more unpleasant odor would better match the situation, not that he was complaining.

"You _mustn't _venture far into the forest," Gerty finally continued. "Stay near the cliff. There are… stories, horrifying tales… I cannot vouch for their veracity, but… it is not worth the risk. They say… that the forest's heart is cold. Stay… near the cliff."

"_What_ stories?" asked Dorothy, leaning closer. "What must we avoid?"

"People go into the forest and many… many don't return. There is talk amongst those in Emerald City, of creatures… that live deep in the forest, creatures… that even the sharpest blade cannot kill … for they are already dead, yet they walk…"

Dorothy let out an involuntary cry; Scarecrow gripped her shoulder in an attempt to comfort her, but truly he felt just as frightened as she sounded. A spasm twisted Gerty's body as if some great being was wringing him dry, and when he settled again his eyes roved across the mackerel skies above.

"The flares…" he breathed, and Scarecrow felt himself shudder. "Beware the flames…"

"Boy am I glad Lion isn't hearing this," muttered Tin Man, sounding a bit muffled. Scarecrow glanced up and saw that Tin Man was weeping, and possibly had been for a while.

"I heard that," came Lion's voice, causing Scarecrow and Dorothy to jump a bit. "I heard _all _of that," Lion continued wearily. Scarecrow turned to see that Lion was still laying down where he'd fainted.

"Oh Lion, are you alright?" said Dorothy, though she would not let go of Gerty's hand.

"I'm alive. I just know I'd faint if I got up and saw what was going on over there."

"Yeah…" said Scarecrow.

"_Dorothy_," rasped Gerty, and the group turned back to face the man.

"Yes, I'm right here."

"Brief though it was… I could not have hoped… for a grander adventure…" Gerty closed his eyes for a moment, looking almost content, and breathed a few shaky breaths. Then a disgruntled look came across his features and he glanced about distastefully. "Oh, what a mess I've made…"

"Don't say that. You've done no such thing," said Dorothy.

"Oh pish… Completely… dreadful. Please don't bother to bury this mess."

Dorothy tried to respond but it was hopeless, for she was now sobbing too. Toto gazed up into her face with wide eyes and rested his chin upon her knee.

"Burn me on a pyre of sweetgrass…" he wheezed. His words had become so breathy and faint that Scarecrow had to lean forward to catch what he said. The man's eyes squeezed shut, opened, and shut again. His grip on Dorothy's hand quivered, and then lost all strength.

"Well, I'm done," he whispered. "Toodle-pip…"

Gerty's eyes fluttered and his wandering pupils seemed, for the briefest of moments, to focus on Scarecrow, and then a sighing breath escaped from between his lips, a breath which sounded like 'that's farewell', but it was so quiet that Scarecrow couldn't be sure he'd heard it at all.

Gerty's eyes did not shut, but Scarecrow knew the man was dead by the almost undetectable drift of the pupils, as if some bond between the two eyes had broken and they could not live without the connection. Scarecrow could see his own reflection in Gerty's left eye, and it became cold, as if mirrored from a pond on the rim of freezing.

It was a while before any of them could speak again. Dorothy whispered that she couldn't bear the thought of doing away with Gerty's body when it was in such a state, so Tin Man and Scarecrow did their best to make their late friend look as respectable as possible. This took time, as they had little to work with and Scarecrow kept having to periodically turn away. They rearranged Gerty's coat to make it look more whole, and they shut Gerty's eyes. Scarecrow took off his blue neckerchief and wiped from Gerty's face the worst of the bloodstains. After that, the group worked in a strange quiet, gathering handfuls of the dried grass that carpeted the ground up to the treeline. It was this grass, this sweetgrass, that Scarecrow had been smelling, perfuming the air as it was crushed beneath Gerty's body and beneath the weight of the others. Periodically Dorothy would make Tin Man stop what he was doing so she could dab away his tears and oil any affected hinges. The minutes dragged into hours; they pressed handfuls of sweetgrass under and next to and on top of Gerty's remains to cover him well and completely, and then mounded the grass on top of the body until only Tin Man could see over the top of the pile.

Tin Man said softly that they should place a ring of stones around the mound of grass, to keep the rest of the little field from lighting on fire when the body burned. Stones were not difficult to find; the ground at the edge of the woods, and into the forest, seemed more covered in rock than with soil, and they all set to work hauling stones, Tin Man and Lion providing most of the muscle. Scarecrow had lost a fair amount of straw from the rip behind his shoulder and was finding it rather impossible to lift anything bigger than Toto's head. When enough stones were in place, the sun was already settling down into the unending crevasse to the west, and the blue hours before night were upon them. Dorothy crouched and set to work with her flint and steel but the tears in her eyes made seeing difficult and her hands trembled so much that she grazed her knuckles several times before a spark finally leapt out and caught on the dried grass.

They all stood back – Scarecrow standing behind the others – and watched as the tiny lick of flame gathered strength. At first it seemed reluctant to grow as it crept along the dry stalks, and Dorothy leaned forward to blow on the flame. This gave it new life, and Scarecrow stepped back further. Tin Man and Lion and Dorothy stood a wary enough distance away, watching as the flames chewed through the sweetgrass, down into the core of the pile where Gerty rested, and then it was as if the fire grew a heart of its own. The scented smoke was gentle upon their senses, and this strange kindness settled around them. Mild as the smoke was, the fire was a different sort of presence altogether. Everything within the stony margins burned and the great, yellow flame plumed itself into the sky and spat sparks and ash; Scarecrow backed away, loathe to leave his friends but unable to stop himself. Toto stepped away as well, but stayed within several bounds of Dorothy. The plume grew ever taller and the air grew sweeter and thick with heat until Scarecrow had retreated to the very edge of the woods and could feel the cool breath of the forest upon his back.

The sun had completely left them by this time. To Scarecrow, his friends appeared as silhouettes, pressed together before the flames, heads bowed against the falling ash and grieving together to witness the pyre. Scarecrow wept alone and wished he weren't made of straw so that he could stand and mourn with them.

Dorothy must have felt his absence or his loneliness, for she turned and saw him standing by the trees, and made her way over to him and pressed her cheek against his chest. He put his arms around her shoulders and was comforted, though not enough to stop sobbing, and he was sorry to be dropping tears onto Dorothy's head. Soon Lion joined them as well, and sat next to Scarecrow's feet to watch the blaze as if he hadn't the will to stand anymore. Dorothy and Scarecrow sank down next to Lion, Toto put his head in Dorothy's lap, and the four of them watched the last lonely silhouette stand by as the man who had saved his life burned.


End file.
